Dying for You
by DirtyLittleTruth
Summary: After the war, Hermione has sunk into her own Hell trying to defeat death, while Draco tries to drag her back, but when she steps over the lines, the ministry orders Draco to bring her back. Which he will do in the only way he knows how.fullsummary insid.
1. Hell

Hello everyone out in the Fan Fiction universe. This is my first fanfic. I saved my Fan Fiction virginity for a story between Mr Draco Malfoy and Hermione Granger, the splendid couple that i like to pretend actually ended up together in the books. I hope i have posted everything correctly, and that you enjoy the story. I'm writing this story mainly for myself, but, i hope that everyone will enjoy it as much as i do. I have an outline for this story so i hope to upload a chapter each week. I checked by grammer twice and am sorry for any mistakes.

Disclaimer: Oh how rich i would be if i owned the characters that J.K Rowling owns, but, Alas, i do not. However, I do own the story line, of which i am very proud.

Summary: Hermione has been a slow downward spiral since the end of the war, and has developed an obsession with solving the mystery of death. For more than a few reasons. After saving each other's lives, Draco Malfoy, Newly appointed ministry official, takes it upon himself to watch over the frail Mudblood. However, when Hermione takes her obsession to new heights and is put on house arrest, it is malfoy that decides he must rehabilitate her, in the only way the dominating Slytherin knows how. Sparks will fly as Hermione works towards her goal and Malfoy tries to drag her back from her own personal hell. Dark, sad, and romantic. Some love scenes to come but nothing to graphic for this website. If you want all the lemony goodness, as i know most of you do, head over to my other account on and search for this tile.

Chapter One

It was the same thing every day.

Day in, day out.

Hermione would wake up and go to work, and she would stay there until the day was gone. Every day, exactly the same.

Not that she minded it. In fact, one could say that she was obsessed with her job.

After the war, she had developed an interest in the unknown aspects of wizardry and had applied for a position in the department of mysteries. This is where she would head every day; Down those dark corridors in the deepest parts of the ministry of magic. Here, in her office, she would spend her day; eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner while wasting away the hours between her office and labs.

She was the only ministry official working in these specific labs. It was lonely sometimes, but there was always Harry and Ron who would come and talk with her sometimes.

These were her days, working, completely obsessed with her objective.

Day in, day out.

The war had changed her. When she wasn't bending her mind with the mysteries of the wizarding world, she was out doing the craziest things she could think of. She was a frequent skydiver and bungee-jumper. Her fear of heights just made her jumps all the better.

Her sleepless nights were spent racing highways on her Ducati. She hardly slept.

Dreams of death haunted her whenever she did.

Work was all she had. Her time with harry and Ron, the only thing keeping her remotely sane.

"What did you do to your arm, mione," Harry would whisper, his voice filled with concern.

"I fell, rock-climbing. It's nothing serious."

"You need to be more careful, mione," Ron would say, "Why do you do this to yourself?"

That was the question, wasn't it? Why does she do it? Why work so hard? Why the nightmares and the death wish adrenaline stunts?

"I do it to stay sane, Ron. To feel alive."

"But, why?"

Why? They would always ask why, everyday.

"It's just a scratch Ron. No big deal."

"We're worried about you, mione," and she would almost feel Harry putting a hand on her shoulder.

It would tear her apart everyday when they would come and visit her in her work, in her obsession. Others she could deal with, but they always got to her.

"You know we will always be here for you, we would never leave you, "Ron would whisper an inch from her ear.

"But, you did, "she would whisper back.

That was the answer to the question. Why did she do it? Because they had left. They had left here alone.

"We couldn't let you follow us, Hermione," Harry would reaffirm almost every day. "We could save you, and we did. Don't throw that away by trying to kill yourself."

"I'm not trying to kill myself," she would shout.

"Then what are you doing," Ron would ask. So calm. They were always so calm.

"I'm trying to bring you back."

"We can't come back, mione."

"Yes, you can, and I'll be the one to do it."

And it was here that their conversations would always end as Hermione let the resurrection stone fall out of her hand.

The lab would fall quiet once more and she would return to her work.

Day in, day out.

Slowly driving herself insane.

Five years Previous

They were in the middle of the greatest battle of their age. Hogwarts was a warzone; the place of the final battle between good and evil. The ground, littered with bodies from both sides. Harry stood in the middle of the Great Hall facing Voldemort. The sparks flying from their wands at speeds almost too fast to see .A very terrifying dance to watch. The Horcruxes were gone, Harry had died and come back, and the final deciding moments were pressing close. And while people fought around her, Hermione was working on the final step of the plan her, Harry, and Ron had worked on.

"As soon as I attack Voldemort, Hermione, try and get as many people out as possible. I'm sure if I start to win, He'll attempt a last ditch effort to kill everyone with him."

So there she was, dodging curses and dragging people out of the castle. She managed to get most of their fallen out and even some of theirs as well.

Narcissa Malfoy was one such person. She had a deep gash in her side and kept screaming for Draco. It was obvious she was never there to fight, but to look for her son amidst the battle. Hermione went to leave her in the grass, but she grabbed her sleeve. Tears staining her face she begged Hermione to find Draco and save him.

Unable to deny her, she promised to find him and dove once more into the pit of death and flying curses.

Hermione found Draco fighting in the back corner with an unknown death eater.

"I'm on your side you twit!" Draco kept yelling, but the death eater wasn't listening. He was attacking blindly, drunk on bloodlust, and he was gaining the upper hand.

Draco was knocked down by a curse the split open his leg and almost received the death curse, if not for Hermione who jumped in at that exact moment.

Draco was attempting to stop the bleeding on his leg, unsuccessfully. Hermione dropped down at his side and reached to help, but Draco pulled away.

"Don't touch me, mud blood," he snarled, and then had to duck as they both dogged an ill aimed curse.

"I wouldn't except I promised your mother I would get you out."

"You know where my mother is?" His voice changed immediately, concern filling his eyes as he let her help him to his feet.

"Yes, I apparated her out of the castle, now, let's go ferret, I'm not going to stay here and die with you of all people."

Hermione was about to apparate when a large, ear shattering bang rang through the hall and everyone stopped and turned towards Harry and Voldemort. Ron had moved behind Voldemort, and held him without magic, preventing him from moving as Harry aimed and held a curse at Voldemort's Chest. However, the curse was reacting strangely with the Dark Lord, as if he was absorbing the energy and building it up.

At once, Hermione realized that this was what Harry had been talking about. Voldemort's last attempt to kill Harry. She also realized what Harry and Ron were doing. They were going to sacrifice themselves to kill him. To hold him in place till the curse finishes its deadly mission.

Harry yelled for everyone to run and people began to apparate away until only draco, who couldn't walk and couldn't leave Hermione, because after all she knew where his mother was ( and the small fact that she had saved his life), and Hermione were left to witness the sad seen before them.

Hermione knew her friends; they had been planning this without her. Well, like hell they were going to do this alone, and she started to head towards her best friends. She would go with them. It was only right.

"Hermione, get out of here!" Harry yelled.

"No, I'm staying."

Voldemort's screams of pain grew and a metaphysically wind whipped around to Great Hall. The magic was building to a crescendo and would soon be too much for any of them to control.

Knowing it was pointless yelling sense at Hermione, Harry looked past her to Draco.

"Malfoy, if get her out of here."

Draco stared stunned at the person he had hated for so long.

"Malfoy, if you have ever done any good in this world, please, get Hermione out of here."

Snapping out of his daze, he didn't even think as he obeyed the final wish of The-Boy-Who-Lived. He grabbed Hermione by the waist as she yelled to be let go.

"No, let me go! Harry! Ron! No! I love…" but, it was too late, she was out of the castle in the forest just in time to turn and see the Great Hall explode in a grand, green outburst.

Hermione just stared at the place her friends had once been. Where only moments ago they had stood, fighting and living and where now they ceased to be.

The shock slowly gave way to denial, which gave way to outright screaming. She screamed at the top of the lungs and fell to her knees. She lost all reason and time.

She kept yelling for what seemed like hours, until her voice was gone and her knuckles were bleeding from striking the ground.

Reason slowly came back to her and she realized for the first time that someone was rubbing slow circles on her back. She turned her tear streaked face to see Draco sitting with her. His eyes were staring emptily at the burning castle. After while, he realized Hermione was no longer making any noise and turned to see her watching his actions which he immediately stopped. He backed away from her and uttered a quick thank you before he apparated away.

Hermione sat in a daze, staring at the castle; the place where she, Ron, and Harry had lived for years together. The place the all had called home. Their home was now just and empty burning shell. Almost like herself.

This brought fresh hurt to her heart and she grabbed the ground and tore at the dirt and grass, just wanting to destroy something. However, she grabbed something that was not quite a rock and was smooth to the touch. She held it up to the light and recognized what it was from the shape.

The resurrection stone.

This must have been where Harry threw it before facing Voldemort for the first time. She held it and turned it over in her hands observing its color. It was beautiful and had a strange way of making her forget her hurt. Then a voice broke through the trance of the stone and froze her in place.

"Hermione, please don't cry."

She turned, and there stood Harry and Ron, whole and alive, and yet not alive at the same time.

And that was how her Hell began.


	2. Fighting On

**Sorry guys. I ended up picking up and moving randomly. Good news is that i'm not homeless anymore. Woot. I'll try and post more often now that i have a apartment again. :) I also had a hard time starting this story again, but i think i got a handle on where i need to go. Hope you enjoy. **

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Hermione was both very weak and extremely strong.

Weak because every day she gave in to the selfish desire to take the stone and turn it thrice in hand. She hid behind her work and used the excuse that it was for research when, in truth, she just wanted someone to talk to.

Strong because it takes a special kind of mind to withstand daily self inflicted torture. For that was what she was doing. No matter if she knew it or not she was slowly slipping from reality.

Even though she longed for companionship, she secluded herself from most physical contact. Her old friends from Hogwarts were mostly gone, having moved on with their lives or tired of the unanswered owls they would send her way. The Weasleys would check on her from time to time, make sure that she was alive and somewhat healthy, but they too only did this out of courtesy.

No. Hermione had no one but the spectral forms of Harry and Ron, and she liked it that way. They were a constant reminder of her failure. She should have been able to save them. She was supposed to be the brains. In her mind, she had been too slow in figuring anything out about the Horcruxes; too slow at the end to be of any use to anyone.

Shortly after the fall of Voldemort, the rest of the wizarding world seemed to break apart. Hogwarts was burned down and the ministry was soon to follow. It was an apocalyptic few years and Hermione spent them in a daze. The order grew in number and soon was able to overtake what was left of the Death Eaters. Previous followers of Voldemort's soon switched sides; Nott, Malfoy, Parkinson, and Zabini were among the ones she knew of. Whether they did it to save their own skins or out of a genuine change of heart Hermione never knew nor did she care. She continued fighting almost in a coma like state. All that mattered to her at first was revenge. She wanted to see them all pay. They had to die for what they did to her, to her friends, and to her safe little world that ceased to exist the day she first heard the word Voldemort.

She fought like a crazy person and, at that time, didn't dare to touch the stone. She feared what Harry and Ron would say. She didn't want to see the disapproving look in their eyes when they saw her covered in blood. She knew she had changed, and for once she was glad. She had the strength to attack them first; to make the first move. She threw herself into the major planning of battles. She was there on the front lines at every confrontation. She was there when the order finally reclaimed London. She fought and killed during what was soon to be known as the last stand of Voldemort's followers as they were pushed back into the deeps of the ministry.

Ironically the last of the most loyal followers to the pervious dark lord fell in the vary chamber where she now spent most of her days. When the last Death Eater fell by her wand she heard silence for the first time since Malfoy apparated her out of the great hall and her friends fell. The silence in her head was complete as she started at the unseeing eyes of the mindless follower at her feet. The room around her had exploded in cheers of joy and exultation, but she heard none of it. She just saw the blood and the eyes of the people at her feet and her head filled with a burning, deafening silence.

Then through her mind-numbed state she heard the voices calling from behind the veiled archway. They called her name and she could hear them all. All the people she had lost. They called to her, crying from just out of sight, and Harry and Ron's voices were the most prominent.

It was then that she knew she had to see them. She couldn't deny herself anymore. She took the stone, which she always carried on her, and turned it. Tears of pain from the bitter sweet sight immediately had sprung to her eyes as they stared at her from across the room.

"Where did you go Hermione," is all they said, in perfect unison. Over and over they repeated their phrase. Their voices had seemed to build to a crescendo in the room until she couldn't take it anymore. They were breaking her soul with their cries but she hadn't been able to let the stone go. It wasn't until a hand had reached around her and taken the stone from her that she noticed she had been shaking and screaming.

Everyone in the room had gathered around her, fearing that she had been hurt, but when she did not respond they began to fear she had lost her mind.

It was a tall, blond man in the back of the crowd that surrounded Hermione who had figured out what was happening. It was his eyes that she looked up into when Harry and Ron disappeared and it was his hand that had taken the stone from her grasp. She had continued to return his gaze, using it as a kind of lifeline until her shaking had stopped. He had looked at her with such knowing sadness, like he knew what she was seeing and then placed the stone back in her pocket and moved to the back of the room once again. Hermione had soon apparted out of the ministry, unable to take the pitying looks she was getting for her break down.

That first time she had only been able to bear holding the stone for a couple of seconds, but over the next few weeks she couldn't resist seeing them some more. So she had continued to give in. Until listening to their whispers was her new lifeline. Her new sanity since revenge had been achieved.

It was then that she had decided to find a way to bring them back, and in doing so she had unknowingly forsaken a part of herself. She locked herself away from all things living to surround herself with the dead. She ventured out only to test the strains on her body in some new daring way, almost killing herself in the process. She kept her mind sane with suicidal joy rides and solitary daredevil stunts and then would slink back down into her mind to continue to ponder the cure for fate.

In her search through the mysteries of death she had begun to forget to live.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

Malfoy had done well for himself since the fall of Voldemort.

He had soon switched sides after the death of his former master, and it had proved to be the wisest choice he had ever made.

Through his deeds and his fighting skill he had earned the trust of the Order and placed himself in line to work at the new ministry. Indeed most of the order that had been reinstated after the last followers fell was because of him. He dove in head first to help reinstate the Ministry of Magic and its policies, and the fact that it helped him both politically and financially was only an added bonus. He had worked hard to maneuver himself back into the good graces of the people. He did not want his family name to be a curse instead of the blessing that it was just because of the actions of his now deceased father.

So here he was, years after the final battle had been waged; his life was going great, he was rich, headed several departments at the ministry, and he liked to boast that it was all because of his cleaver strategy. But every now and then he was reminded as to why he was here in the first place instead of dead back in the great hall where, by all rights, he should have been. He would see her from time to time, walking the halls of the Ministry, though he was sure she did not see him.

She had saved his life and he hated it. Not because she had saved his life, but because he had never been able to figure out why she had done it. He had come to the conclusion that she had seen him as weak and felt like she had to help him and this had made him angry. Who was she to assume that he was weak? So he had set out to prove her wrong. He had switched sides and thrown himself into every battle he could. He would fight right beside her, trying to prove that Draco Malfoy was not weak. However, as he fought with her in those last battles, he started to notice her lack of luster. She seemed to be missing and just wasn't notching how brave and not weak he was being. The witch was constantly making him livid and she wasn't even aware of his anger, which of course just had made him all the angrier.

Yet again, she had stunned him, when, at the last stand down in the department of mysteries, she had pulled out the resurrection stone and commenced her screaming fit. It was then that he had finally understood why she had withdrawn. He knew whats he had been holding from the stories that his mom used to read him as a child, and he recognized that pained look on her face as she stared at something across the room. He had felt that pain before.

It was pity for her that had moved him to help her on that day, and ever since he had been unable to face her again. Even though he owed all he was to her. She echoed a pain in her eyes that he felt all too deeply himself. That he felt even now, with all his riches and power. So he avoided her whenever possible.

o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o

However, fate had other plans for Draco and Hermione than to let them wallow in pain and self loathing. She was cruel bitch.

So it was that on a very quiet day in the office on a random Tuesday afternoon in March that something unexpected happened to Draco's office. It had started to shake.

He was later to find out that this was not because of some random earthquake, but because of an incident that had occurred in the lower levels of the Ministry, and it was directly because of this event that the Minister himself had walked into his office later that same day and opened with, "I am promoting you to the head of a new department."

Taking the comment in stride Draco simply queried, "which one and why?"

"The department of Mysteries, specifically the Fate and Finality section. As to the why, mostly because you seem to have a knack for fixing the unfixable, and since it was pretty much almost blown to shit today by Hermione Granger who I thought to be brilliant, I would say it needs some help." And with that he spun on his heel and was gone, leaving a very confused Draco to stare after him.


End file.
